


A Little Game of Catch

by MorpheusX



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Post Reichenbach, Season/Series 02 Spoilers, Suicide Attempt, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-07
Updated: 2013-10-07
Packaged: 2017-12-28 16:01:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,456
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/993825
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MorpheusX/pseuds/MorpheusX
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They sync up. When John throws a pen, Sherlock can catch it without looking. They're like two halves of a whole.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Little Game of Catch

**Author's Note:**

> This work is not betaed, not britpicked, and took all of a day for my cruel mind to write.
> 
> I am so, so sorry.

It took them some time to click, of course. Nobody - not even the detective and the doctor - could fit so perfectly so soon. Still, when one shot a man for the other, they were well on their way to acting as one.

One had a bad habit of talking to the other when he wasn't there. It was as though he thought that his words could be carried on the wind, brought to the only person who had ever cared to hear him speak; as though he saw that connection early on, saw the way that they would become one entity; not Sherlock and John but Sherlock-and-John.

It was an early case, one that the blogger later called "The Blind Banker", when their closeness truly came to light. One quick "pass me a pen", one quick toss, one catch without looking, without _needing_ to look because he knew where it would be and when. Just like that, they were a pair, two alike who couldn't bear the separation.

Chlorine and white tile almost broke that pair. The smell and the lights and the Irish accent lilting over it all, quick fear-betrayal-anger-hurt-fear in the eyes of one and only a soldier's gleam in the other's. Sniper rifles and a bomb, two items that would have ruined any others, only served to bring back the danger that kept them close.

When they came back in the cab from that night, the shorter man flipped a coin that he had had in his pocket back to the taller one. He nearly fumbled it, nearly dropped the metal circle, but captured it safely in the end. It was in his long coat without a second thought.

From then on, the doctor would pass his detective whatever he happened to have his hands on as soon as he'd walk into a room. It was rarely out of necessity but instead a reassurance - _I'm here you're here we're both here together and I wouldn't want to be anywhere else._ Pens, phones, money, books, a gun on one memorable occasion (luckily in the safety of the flat, not in front of the policemen-who-barely-trust) are all passed from weathered hands to violinist's tapering fingers, a breath that speaks of their connection.

For two months, it's a phone. The soldier wants the chemist away from the woman and so he volunteers his phone, his possessions, his whole being in a way that hadn't been given so explicitly since _you're an army doctor_ and _oh, God, yes!_ It was enough, enough, enough that they could still predict where the other was with closed eyes, that they were John-and-Sherlock and Sherlock-and-John and never one without the other.

There's a near-drop when _let's have dinner_ comes back and goes again, shaking their worlds with her marionette's strings. They play their little game of catch more often during those times, tossing items with a certain desperation to prove that they're still there and why should we need anyone else?

In armchairs, one flings a used teabag behind himself as he storms off with a _wonder why?_ When it hits the ground, carpeting muffling the noise, the second can only stare down into his own cup. Where is the duo, the connection, the care? He runs after his other, apologizing, using words that he himself has been complimented with because he doesn't know any others. What other compliments has he been dealt? He can't say _good violin, but try to be a bit faster_ or _bloody hell, that's unnatural_ or the underlying _freak freak freak_ that he hears daily. No, he has only one person who ever thought to pay him a nice word without wanting something in return, and when that one person kicks angrily at a rock and it bounces off of the ground, practically into his hand, it's still possible that everything will be fine.

Then there are chases and cases and a trial that ends with the cruel prince free, and what do they have now but each other?

John is, for once, the catcher when Sherlock drops his phone.

He wishes that he could have caught the man instead.

***

When he goes home, he automatically tosses the red pen in his pocket towards their armchairs - another set of two in the flat.

It hits the floor with a loud clatter.

***

John Watson is a broken man.

Oh, he looks fine. He still goes to his job at the clinic. He still smiles at Sarah, but it no longer touches his eyes. He still greets Mrs. Hudson with a brief kiss on the cheek when he visits 221B, which is rare because those seventeen steps are more of an impasse every day. He still goes to the pub with a few friends, though Lestrade is less of a common face at those. It's hard to forgive and harder to forget.

No, it's the spaces in between that reveal him once more as a soldier. When he walks, he limps again in a way that he hasn't since a certain blind alleyway chase. He's started to use a cane whenever he needs to go more than a mile or so. His shopping lists are plain, no longer filled with occasional requests for seven different types of packaged chicken; the shopping is conducted without any shouting at machines. Perhaps some shouting would do him good, since he's starting to look at his gun like he had when he returned from the war. It's the same drop, really; the fall (and isn't _that_ an irony in and of itself?) from life on the edge to a common existence, a boring existence. When the doctor gives himself to something - the war or the Work - he gives himself to it so fully, so utterly, that ripping it away tears him in half.

Half is all that he is now. He's never Sherlock-and-John anymore, just John-and-void. Every day that the void remains unfilled, his empty gaze lingers just a few seconds longer on his Browning.

***

It's three years almost to the day - _eighty-nine hours,_ he thinks distractedly, because it's the sort of thing that his closest friend might have done once. _Eighty-nine hours and fifty…forty-nine minutes._

He's long since moved past just gazing. The gun has made its way into his thoughts whenever he goes to the clinic that he transferred to after one-thousand-three-hundred-twenty-nine hours because seeing the looks of pity on everyone's faces was too difficult. He doesn't want pity; he wants danger and Chinese food and violin concerts at three in the morning. Now, he holds the handle in his hands, feels the grip that had always signified that he was in the right place.

He slides his dog tags over his head. John-and-void is nothing if not considerate, since the void never bothered with saying sorry or thank-you or if-you-please. He steps into the shower with the sliding glass door, one that he bought specifically because there was no nightmare for his mind to conjure up behind opaque curtains. There's a curious _swoosh_ when he closes it behind him, the same hand then swinging up to check the clip. It has one bullet in it, just like it has since five-hundred-sixty-two hours. Everything in his life is numbers now. Numbers don't have emotions; numbers aren't missing half of their self; numbers didn't watch that half topple from Bart's and hit the pavement. Numbers don't want to step right off after him.

Of course he knows the best way to place the cool metal against his temple; he was a doctor and a soldier and a bodyguard of sorts. He knows how to hurt a body and how to stitch it up afterwards.

In, out, in, out - one breath. Two. Three. The door to his flat opens and closes, but he doesn't hear it over the roaring in his head. Once more, he's flirting with death, and he feels more alive than he has since -

The bathroom door slams open, loudly enough that he wheels around and the gun's muzzle cants towards the ceiling. It's a good thing, too, because the man standing in his doorway (pale hair cut short and dyed ginger clothes ripped but _breathing there alive with him_ ) is nearly enough of a shock to close his finger on the trigger. As it is, he's lucky enough to click the safety on (to lose the connection that he can already breathe in again now would be true devastation) before the shower is opened and long arms (lanky bandaged but undoubtedly _there_ ) are around him.

As darkness (sweet darkness, not the spell that he had been waiting for only thirty-three seconds before) overtakes the doctor, the Browning slips from his grasp.

A certain detective's hand catches it.


End file.
